


Surprise

by synchronik



Series: Not The Prettiest Game [8]
Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-02
Updated: 2014-12-02
Packaged: 2018-02-27 21:16:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2707070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/synchronik/pseuds/synchronik
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The parade and the ensuing celebrations are for the team, and Chris is a good guy, but he is no longer a Giant. He hasn't been for years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Surprise

Ryan is home when Chris wakes up, asleep on the couch with his arms around a throw pillow, the tv playing a crime drama on mute.

He's a surprise. The World Series parade is tomorrow morning and Ryan's going, or, at least, he said he was going when they talked last night, so Chris didn't expect to see him until Saturday night at the earliest, depending on whether Ryan decided to hang out with the guys in the city for a couple days before coming back. 

Chris wouldn't blame him if he stayed in San Francisco for a week post-parade. One of the announcers said it once, maybe Kuiper, that it's a little bittersweet to win a championship because the same team isn't coming back next year. That sounds like Kuiper, who is as sentimental as they come, bringing the truth. Even the Giants, who bring back a lot of guys, who value roster consistency and chemistry more than any other management Chris has experienced, even _they_ don't bring everyone back. And this year, Ryan might be one of the guys missing when April rolls around.

Chris runs a hand through his hair, erasing the thought, and goes to make himself a cup of coffee. It's early, the sky over the river just beginning to lighten from black to blue. Thanksgiving is coming, then Christmas, and he thinks that this year he'll call his ex-wife and see if she'll let him take Jason for a couple of days. He's a shitty father, and he doesn't want to fuck up Jason, who has a step-father he adores, but Annie will know if it's okay and she won't be shy about telling him.

Besides that, maybe they'll take a vacation or something. Ryan likes snow, so maybe someplace in Europe. Or maybe Australia, where there won't be snow. He's never been and it seems cool. He wonders if Ryan went while he was in Japan.

He wanders back over to the couch, sipping from his mug. Ryan sleeps like the dead: the noise of the coffee machine has had no impact on him. He's still wearing khakis and a plaid button down in primary colors--it looks like a roadmap for Lego Land vomited on him--but his shoes and socks are on the floor.

Chris leans down and runs one knuckle up the sole of Ryan's foot.

"uh," Ryan mumbles, pulling up his legs. Chris sits on the vacated cushion and pulls Ryan's feet into his lap, stroking one hairy ankle under hem of his pants. It's Law & Order on the television, an old one, from when the black guy was still a D.A. Ryan sighs deeply, once, twice, and then he's blinking awake. "Hey," he says.

"Hey," Chris says. He shifts his coffee mug to the other hand and rubs Ryan's knee through the cotton. "You're back early."

"Mmm." Ryan rolls onto his side, away from the television. "Going back tonight."

Chris nods. "Sure."  
Ryan reaches out and grabs Chris's arm, using it to pull himself up into an awkward half-sitting, half-kneeling position, then lowers himself down again, ending up with his head in Chris's lap, shoulder braced against Chris's thigh, breath warm on Chris's stomach. "Mmm," he says again.

Chris strokes Ryan's temple and sips coffee. Ryan's losing his hair--his hairline creeping back from his forehead like a wave at low tide--and if he doesn't do something about it, he's going to end up with a fringe around his head like a monk, but he's not vain about it. Chris wonders if he'll still be attracted to Ryan when he's bald. He rolls a couple of strands of Ryan's hair between his fingers and thinks " _yeah, probably_."

* * *

He thinks maybe Ryan's going to doze off again, still tired from the red eye, but after a few minutes, Ryan has slid forward until he's mouthing Chris's nascent erection through the thin material of his boxer shorts. Ryan slips his hand into Chris's gaping fly and nudges Chris's cock through the opening, and closes his mouth over it. Chris sets his coffee down and leans back, trying to keep his hand on Ryan's shoulder and not his head. It was only after he started sucking dick on the regular that he realized how annoying it was to have someone pushing his head down over and over again, but it's still hard to resist.

Ryan pushes himself up on one hand and kisses Chris's neck, then his mouth, his fingers fumbling at his own shirt buttons. "Lie down," he says.

There's an interlude of them shifting and adjusting and then Ryan's shirt is off and he's tugging Chris's shorts off and pushing his shirt up, lying between his legs. "Like this, okay?" Ryan whispers right in his ear, rubbing his erection against Chris's.

"Yeah, yeah," Chris pants. Ryan's weight on him is delicious, almost as good as the slide of Ryan's cock against his. When Ryan is on top, Chris can feel the thick muscles of his back, his ass flexing in Chris's hands. He'd never done this before Ryan, grinding, at least not since he was a teenager trying to urge a female classmate to let him feel her under her bra. The first time Ryan suggested it, Chris had been...less than enthusiastic.

"What's the point?" Chris had moaned, curling his fingers around Ryan's cock, "let's fuck."

Ryan had squirmed beneath him, but resisted, his hands flexing on Chris's shoulders, hips pulsing. "Just...um, uhh...just try it, just c'mon..."

So he had tried it, thinking at the time that it was a little juvenile, rubbing off on one another, until Ryan had squeezed their cocks together with one slippery hand, gripping Chris's ass with the other, and come underneath him, shooting onto to his stomach and crying his name. Chris was surprised to admit that, juvenile or not, it was pretty hot.

It is even hotter when Ryan is on top, like he is now. Being pinned under him, listening the small gasps Ryan makes with every thrust, feeling his body get hot as his chest flushes with blood--it's the experience more than the direct contact with his cock that makes Chris orgasm, and once he comes, Ryan comes, moaning "chris, oh chris, oh god," in his ear as his thrusts speed up. Chris licks his throat, trying to taste the words.

* * *

After a minute, Ryan hitches up his pants and goes to get water. Chris looks up at the ceiling and listens to the sounds of him moving around the kitchen: the soft thunk of the cabinet door, the grind of the icemaker. He will have months to hear these noises now. Four months. It seems like forever and not enough.

Ryan hands a glass over the back of the couch. From this angle, his body rises out of the open fly of his khakis like a merman, thick waist, wide chest, broad shoulders. He doesn't have a six-pack like some of the guys in the clubhouse, but he looks strong enough to lift a house. There's a series of pictures from the playoff clubhouse celebrations, plastic backdrops and shitty lighting, in which Madison Bumgarner is holding Ryan in his arms like Ryan's a bride about to cross the threshold. Of all the clubhouse pictures Chris looked at (he'd tried to resist, but couldn't help himself, clicking through slideshow after slideshow online, a masochistic impulse that he hadn't been able to control), those made him the happiest, although he couldn’t say why. Looking up at the expanse of Ryan's bare skin, he thinks, _Bumgarner is a beast._

Ryan comes around the corner of the couch and sits down on the cushion in front of Chris's hip, resting a hand on Chris's sternum. "You want to come with?" he asks, looking at the television.

It takes Chris a second until he realizes what Ryan is asking. "To the parade?"

Ryan nods. "We're getting buses or something this time."

Chris tries to take a sip of water, still lying down, and ends up dribbling it down his neck. Does he want to come to the parade? To the parade that isn't for him, with a boyfriend that he can't really tell anyone about, for a World Series he didn't win?

Yes. He wants to go desperately.

"How would that work?" he says, instead.

Ryan shrugs. "They know we're friends."

"Yeah, but..." Chris lets silence finish his sentence. Because there's friends and then there's _friends_ , and the first type, the hetero type, doesn't get to ride on your World Series float with you, no matter how close you are. 

Ryan sighs. "Come anyway," he says to the television. "Stay at the hotel and we'll go out afterwards."

For a second, Chris considers it. But then he sees how it would go, the speculative glances of the other guys, the question behind their smiles--"what are _you_ doing here?"--the hesitance in their welcomes. And not because he's there with Ryan, although some of them would definitely notice that, but because he's there at all. Because the parade and the ensuing celebrations are for _the team_ and Chris is a good guy, but he is no longer a Giant. He hasn't been for years.

"Ry," he says.

"Okay." Ryan pats his hip and stands up. "I'm gonna go take a shower."

* * *

Chris waits until he hears the water go off, then gets to his feet and heads to the bedroom, tugging up his shorts as he goes. Morning light pushes at the edges of the shades, but the room is dark and Ryan's pale skin glows like the moon. He's at the dresser, naked, feeling for clean underwear. Chris stops next to him and puts one hand on his damp shoulder, and Ryan stops moving.

"I want to tell people," Ryan says, head down. "I want to tell people about us."

Chris feels time stop. A dozen thoughts form and vanish in his head. A hundred emotions swirl in his stomach like a school of a fish. It's an eternity until his voice comes back.

"Ryan--"

"I know," Ryan says. "Whatever you're about to say, I know." He pulls away from Chris's hand and goes to sit on the bed.

"It's not that I don't--"

"I _know_ ," Ryan says. 

Anger flashes through him--if Ryan _knows_ then why does he have to be the one to say it?--but he goes and sits next to him anyway. It's just as much not Ryan's fault as it is not his. He pats Ryan's knee. "When's your flight?"

"Nine-ish."

"What did you want to do today?" Chris asks.

"I'm still kind of tired, actually," Ryan says. "And, you know, tomorrow's pretty busy."

"Sure."

Ryan tips to his side and pulls his feet up and slides them under the sheet. The room is silent. Chris thinks about leaving, just standing up and walking out of the room. They aren't fighting. Ryan isn't mad at him. He could just go into the living room and see which Law & Order episode is on. He could go to the gym. He could go get breakfast at the diner down the street, which was what he has planned to do before Ryan showed up, and they could talk later.

Instead, he lies down behind Ryan, hand on his hip, lips pressed against the back of his neck where Ryan's hair is still damp. "I'm sorry," he murmurs.

"I get it." The words fall, flat and hard.

Chris sighs. He doesn't get why he should have to take the blame for something that's no one's fault, why he should have to suffer for something he would change if he could. "Ryan--"

"Can you stop, please?" Ryan says. "I get it, okay? _I get it_."

"Really?" Chris pulls back, frustrated. "Because it doesn't seem like you do."

Ryan rolls over onto his back and glares up at Chris. "I fucking _asked you_ to come with me, and you said no!"

"That has nothing to do with--"

"That has _everything_ to do with this! You won't even tell the people who won't care! You won't even tell the ones who _already know_!"

"And you fucking know why!" Chris shouts. He scrambles out of the bed. If theyre really going to have this argument, it seems important to be standing on his feet. "I don't know why this is so fucking hard for you to compre-"

"Because it _is_! It's two thousand fucking fourteen and I--"

"YOU ALREADY WON!" Chris shouts before he can stop himself. "You have TWO goddamn World Series rings! You've _done it_ , Ryan! _TWICE_! And I never have and if I fucking announce to the whole fucking world that I live with my fucking _boyfriend_ , I _never will_!"

The silence is like a stone between them. Chris can feel his heart thudding against his ribs. Ryan, sitting up in the bedclothes, looks like he does when he's losing, nostrils flared, eyes narrow. His chest is flushed red almost to his stomach. There's a moment, just a moment, when Chris thinks maybe Ryan is going to lunge at him, but he doesn't, and after a second his shoulders sag.

"Ryan," Chris says.

Ryan shakes his head, just once, and lies back down, pulling the sheet up so high it almost covers his face.

* * *

Chris does go out then, gets dressed in the first pair of jeans he can find and a hoodie and leaves. He doesn't know where he's going, but he ends up at a café a few blocks away, a place he's never been to before--he doesn't have much use for cafés in his normal life--with bad art on the walls and a fire in the stone fireplace. He orders a latte and finds an empty armchair. There's a newspaper open on the table next to him so he picks it up. Business section, not sports.

He sits there for an hour, reading about redevelopment projects and a local scandal involving some CEO and trying to forget that what just happened. 

Because if Ryan's serious, if he really means to come out, then one of two things is over--Chris's career or his relationship. If they come out, Chris is done in major league baseball. He's a marginal guy on the roster anyways, a backup catcher who doesn't put up great offensive numbers and doesn't play any other position. He'll be sent down and end up running rehab assignments on some minor league farm team for the next seven years until his knees give out, and that's if someone wants him. It's just as likely that he could be labeled "bad for chemistry" and be out on his ass the minute the league hears the news. There's a lot of talk about welcoming gay players, but that's for the new guys, the fresh-faced draft picks who've been out since middle school, not a 32-year-old who only stuck in the majors because someone else broke his leg.

Or he can leave Ryan, and find his own condo--maybe on the other side of the river, maybe on the other side of the country--and try to forget what being happy is like.

The idea guts him, and that's how he realizes he's already made his decision. If Ryan insists on coming out, Chris will leave. He's got a few more years left in baseball, he thinks, a few more years of money, a few more years of the green expanse of grass under the summer sun, and he wants it. He wants Ryan, too--he loves Ryan more than he's ever loved anyone, more than he knew he could love anyone--but his career has a ticking clock and he knows himself well enough to know that if he chooses Ryan, that clock will go off like a bomb in their relationship and leave Chris with nothing. 

Eventually, he gets up, pushing the newspaper aside, leaving a couple of dollars under the coffee cup. His stomach is crusty with cum, and his hair is fucked up, and it's too late in the day to be in public looking like he looks. It's past eleven, and the street is busier now, dotted with couples heading out for brunch. Several of them have golden retrievers. More than one of the guys has a Pirates hat on. None of them notice him. 

Chris shoves his hands into his pockets and heads back up the hill. He turns the key in the lock, afraid to open the door, but unable to resist. Whatever is about to happen needs to happen.

The foyer is empty. The living room is silent. The kitchen vacant. Chris closes the door behind him, heart racing. If Ryan left--   
\--but his bag is still on the bench, his shoes are still on the floor in front of the couch. For now, he's here.

Chris is about to call his name when Ryan appears in the doorway to the bedroom, in sweatpants and a white t-shirt, a sock in his hand. 

"Hey," Chris says, trying to memorize this moment. If this is it, he wants to remember it.

Ryan is on him in three steps, sweeping him up off his feet, crushing him close. He hooks his arms around Ryan's neck and his legs around Ryan's waist and holds on. He holds on.

"I'm sorry," Ryan whispers. He's kissing Chris's throat. "I'm sorry."

"Me, too," Chris says. He sets his feet on the floor, but doesn't let go, doesn't lift his face from Ryan's shoulder. He can't think anything but _thank you, thank you_ , over and over again, until the words have lost their meaning. 

"I didn't mean to take it out on you. I'm sorry. I didn't think."

"It's okay, it's okay," Chris says. He's on his tiptoes, chest pressed against Ryan's. He never wants to let go.

* * *

Ultimately, of course, he does let go. They separate self-consciously, not looking at each other. Chris brushes his fingers beneath his eyes casually, like maybe a speck of dirt got in them while he was hugging Ryan.

"So, um, sorry," Ryan says again, rubbing Chris's arm.

"It's cool, man," Chris tells him. "I feel the same way. "

"Some day, though..." Ryan trails off, smiling.

"Yep," Chris says. "Someday. When we're done."

"You're sure you won't come tonight?" Ryan takes Chris's hand, folding it between his. "I mean, not because--you know. But the parade." 

Chris shakes his head. "It'll be weird. I'll see you when you come home."

"Okay." Ryan brings Chris's hand to his mouth and kisses the back of it, once, twice. He backs slowly toward the bedroom, tugging Chris along with him all the way back to the bed, until Chris is lying down, his head on Ryan's shoulder. Ryan is only wearing one sock, Chris notices.

"I do want to do it, though," Ryan says, his chest rumbling like the beginnings of an earthquake. "At some point."

"Yeah." Chris understands. Maybe, after he wins a World Series, he'll want to tell, too. For now he's just relieved he doesn't have to. "What do you want to do now?" 

Ryan, who has been stroking his fingertips over Chris's ribs, slips them up under the waistband of his sweatshirt onto his bare skin. "Nothing," he says, and rolls on top of Chris, pinning one of Chris's hands above his head. Chris smiles and closes his eyes; nothing is fine with him.


End file.
